Well, I had an insane time with Addison the other day, but there’s something I can’t get off my mind. He didn’t fix my damn lights!

Okay, I’m lying to myself a little. He fixed more than the lights and I’m incredibly content in class two days later. Even the smartass Linda can’t get on my nerves today. She stands up in front of the class, wearing her stupid fake school uniform that she always wears, and I swear half the class rolls their eyes. Maybe that’s my imagination, but I’m fairly certain she’s not too popular around here.

“Last class when you said that truth is relative,” she begins. “I mean, did you really mean that? Because I asked my dad and he said that—”

“What did he say?” I interrupt her.

“He said that that can’t be true. He said that the world just doesn’t work like that. That’s how we built institutions. That’s how we run the world. With facts,” she says.

“We run the world with our own viewpoints,” I sigh. “But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. This isn’t History class. Let Mr. Drake teach you all about that.”

“Today we’re talking about poetry. William Shakespeare, to be exact. I’m sure all of you have heard of him,” I say.

Time passes like this: I complete the syllabus in a hurried fashion. Shakespeare? He was a beautiful poet who had some choice words on love. Still, one has to wonder whether he got down on his knees for his mistresses after they cooked him breakfast. I bet he did.

I’m thinking about Addison, though. I can’t stop. Even Judy, at lunch, is staring at me funny. “Okay, so things are going well, I presume?” When I don’t answer, she waves her hands in front of my eyes. “Earth to Helena. Mission Control to Helena. Is anybody in there?”

“What?” I ask, spacing out. “Oh, shit. Sorry. I’m tired today.”

“I can see that,” she sighs. “What happened the other day? You weren’t really sick, were you?”

I look up and smile, and then glance back down at my food. I can’t even think about eating right now. “Maybe I was. Maybe I wasn’t. You’ll never know,” I grin.

“You know you only get like eight sick days a year, right? You gotta be smart with those, girl. You can’t just use one here and one there. You have to be strategic. Use the full eight toward the end of the year. Go to Rocky Point or Thailand, or somewhere exotic,” she says.

“Exotic sounds nice.” I smile.

“So, where’d he take you on that date?” she asks, changing the subject.

I smile. “It was actually really fun, to be honest,” I say, thinking back on it. “He took me to the Hummingbird Haven. Have you ever been?”

“Oh, I’ve heard of that! Sounds wonderful,” she says. “So, this is like serious, isn’t it?”

“No,” I frown. “Not serious. Just for fun.”

“Well, then why are you going to animal sanctuaries and shit? That’s like what married couples do,” she says. Then she adds, another jab, “What’s next? A dinner date at IKEA?”

I have to grimace at the thought of that. “Gross,” I mumble. “No. I thought it was cute, actually. He’s trying really hard.”

“So you do really like him,” she says. “Interesting.”

“I don’t know,” I admit. “He is fun to be around. I’ll give him that.”

“And his cock?” she smiles, unabashedly.

“Yeah, it’s nice,” I shrug. She tilts her head at me, and stares. “Okay, it’s life changing. But it’s not just his cock. Anyway, what’ve you been up to? Any progress with any guys?”

“Progress? Me?” she laughs. “There is no progress with me. I meet some guys I like and it usually ends pretty quickly. I’m not exactly the most faithful.”

“A revelation,” I mutter. “Wow, I didn’t know that about you.”

“Yeah, well, it’s not a big deal. I just prefer not to be tied down.” She shrugs.

“You sound like a dude,” I tell her. “You don’t want kids someday?”

“I mean, yeah. Maybe. Well, I don’t know. Does anyone?” she asks.

“I think so.” I shrug back. “I do.”

“The whole thing seems so damn complicated. I’m having a hard enough time keeping my kids in class in check. I’m not sure if I could handle a lifelong partner messing things up for me.”

“I see,” I say, looking awkwardly at the ground, while a bunch of kids run around outside and in the cafeteria.

“Oh!” she suddenly exclaims. “I saw Halloway last night. So there’s something.”

“Halloway? I thought you were over him!” I say.

“What can I say? I’m a woman who likes to give second chances. And third. And fourth. You get the picture,” she admits.

The bell for class rings, but we take our time walking. There’s a 20-minute leeway period usually for this sort of thing.

“So what happened?” I ask her.

“Nothing really,” she slyly smiles. I push her a little and she takes a deep breath before continuing. “God, he really annoys me, you know? He’s like totally out of his mind. Addison probably is, deep down. You gotta really be careful with these military types.”

“Navy,” I correct her again.

“Whatever,” she sighs. “I don’t know, he just like came over out of the blue. He was totally shit-faced and out of his mind, talking about existential things,” she laughs, but there’s a slight seriousness attached to her grin.

“Like what?” I ask her, practically pleading. Addison is really close to Halloway and he never mentioned any of this to me. Maybe he just expected me to know that Halloway is sort of bonkers, or maybe there’s something he doesn’t want me to know. Either way, I’m guiltily curious.

“Like, what it’s like to see the sky explode. That sort of thing,” she says. “And so I tried to calm him down. I got him some coffee and some water, and I rubbed his back. You know, I was trying to be a good woman to him because the last thing I need is a guy going crazy at my place. I just wanted to tame the beast a little.”

“I bet you did,” I laugh.

“Not in that way,” she adds. “But I’ll get to that.”

She continues. “So, he just started saying that he’s seen it happen before. And that it keeps happening. And that no one ever wants to try and stop it, but it keeps going on and on. Basically, I was just thinking he was having some sort of episode. You know, these military guys go through a lot of trauma. It makes sense that he would need to let it out after a while of holding it in.”

“Sure.” I don’t correct her saying “Military” this time. I think of Addison and he’s always so… levelheaded. He’s always present, at least. He hasn’t had any crazy outburst. Not yet, at least. Except, now that I remember it, he did have a nightmare last night. He woke up yelling. But that was just a dream. It wasn’t anything serious.

God, I hope it’s not anything serious…

“Anyway, he woke up after about an hour. He came to and everything was fine. He apologized and I went down on him,” she says, pursing her lips and creasing her eyes.

“Judy!” I exclaim, as we make our way through the hallway of the school.

“What? It’s true,” she says. “I wanted to make him feel good. He deserves it. He fucking served in the Army, Helena. He’s a hero.”

“Navy!” I yell for the last time.

“Whatever,” she says, walking into class. “See you later?”

“Maybe.” I shake my head. The people in this town. I swear they’re all lunatics!